Dash to save drinking water

Peter Ker

MORE than a billion litres of drinking water — enough to supply Melbourne's entire daily water consumption — was rushed out of one of the city's major dams yesterday in a bid to avoid contamination from bushfires.

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A similar mass relocation was expected to be reported to 8am today, with almost all the water being shifted to Cardinia Reservoir.

Melbourne typically uses about 1 billion litres each day.

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It is believed close to 6 billion litres have been moved since the fires began just over a week ago.

Upper Yarra is considered to be Melbourne's second most important reservoir, behind Thomson Dam.

About 2 per cent of the Upper Yarra catchment has burned, meaning any contamination of water supplies is expected to be kept to a minimum.

Other dams have not been so lucky; significant proportions of the forest surrounding O'Shannassy and Maroondah dams have burned, meaning that rainfall in coming weeks would wash large amounts of ash and contaminants into the water.

Melbourne Water managing director Rob Skinner has confirmed he may temporarily decommission Maroondah and any other affected dam, if contamination is as bad as feared.

Maroondah and O'Shannassy are now holding about 11 billion litres of water, and decommissioning means that their water is not drunk for several months to allow purification.

Thomson, which holds about a third of Melbourne's water, has been largely unaffected by the fires, despite a couple of minor flare-ups.

Fire officials said the flames were last night about 40 kilometres from the water at Thomson.

Melbourne Water officials are still waiting to conduct a full inspection of the north-south pipeline, after the bushfires raged over most of its route.

Flames were still being fought within five kilometres of Upper Yarra last night, but fire officials said the blaze was moving away from the reservoir.

Mild weather will give emergency services the opportunity this week to build firebreaks and containment lines for the continuing bushfires.

Slow weather patterns will keep temperatures cool, and rain is expected in the state's east by Wednesday and across central Victoria on Friday night.

At least 500 Defence Force reservists from Victoria have been deployed to help communities with medical attention, shelter and food, Emergency Services Commissioner Bruce Esplin said.

Firefighting experts from the US, New Zealand and Canada are relieving sleep-deprived emergency workers.

A senior meteorologist at the Bureau of Meteorology, Phil King, said extremely hot weather was not expected this week. With